Money Saving Tips That Will Help Bolster Your Travel Budget

Cutting coupons isn’t the only way to save money. Proper spending and budgeting habits can help keep your bank account cushioned. Try these suggestions to better your financial situation and save money for the things that matter most – like traveling!

Know Your Income and Expenses

Tallying your income should be a pretty simple process—just add up your paystubs to see how much money you’re bringing home every month. It’ll be a little bit harder for freelancers, investors, independent contractors, and small business owners because your monthly income can vary. In these instances, try to establish an average baseline. Be sure to calculate taxes and deductions when coming up with your number. Once you know your income, you can compare it to your basic list of expenses: rent, bills, groceries, student loans, etc. These are your mandatory fixed expenses, not pleasures such as shopping or dining out. The most important rule is to spend less than you earn. If comparing these numbers side by side places you in the red, see what bills you can cut or where you can reduce your utilities.

Define Your Goals

Take a look at your life and determine what you want. It could be a new car, a European vacation, braces for your kid, a larger house, or getting out of debt. What are you working on, and how much do you need to contribute each month? If you don’t know where to start, begin with creating an emergency savings fund. Establishing your goals will help motivate you to spend your money smarter, and keeping them in mind might deter you from buying that overpriced hand bag.

Automate Your Savings

A good way to reach your goals faster is to automate your savings. To get started, you can automatically direct a percentage of your income into your emergency fund, short-term goals, or long-term goals. Automation works because it takes the hassle out of saving and does the hard work for you. Consider using free companies such as Qapital who help you save money just by doing the things you do. By linking your debit card and setting rules like rounding up, you’ll effortlessly see your savings account grow.

Create a Budget

Budgeting shouldn’t be a goal—it should be the tool that helps you achieve your other goals. Setting and sticking to a budget might seem daunting, but they’re easy to make. Take your income and subtract your savings portion and fixed expenses. Also deduct non-monthly expenses like insurance premiums, haircuts, and holiday gifts. The rest is yours to spend as you please. Divide it by four and you have your magic number—how much you can spend weekly on lattes, movie tickets, and the like. To keep track of your spending, employ the help of Mint or another company who will give you visual graphics to show you where your money is going.

Use Your Resources

The internet is a great tool for financial success. Ditch those newspaper clippings browse online retailers to receive discounts for online purchases. Research the best bank accounts to earn more interest and credit cards that give you the most cash back. Sign up for every free customer rewards program possible. The internet also allows you to scour multiple sites for price comparisons and can help you figure out which grocery store is best to shop at given the items you buy most frequently. Last minute booking sites like Travelocity.com will save you a lot on travel expenses, while a promo code for The Bay can help you save on home goods. There’s truly an online deal for everything you can imagine, so do your research.

Practice Smart Habits

A few simple behaviors can contribute to wiser spending. For example, to avoid instant gratification, master the 30-day rule and hold off on any big purchases to see if your urge has passed after a month. Turn off the television to reduce your electricity bill, limit your exposure to ads, and maybe even free up some time for a side hustle. When you’re heading to the store, go equipped with a list of items that you need—and stick to it. Staying in versus going out, or making gifts instead of buying them, are also wise spending choices.

Make personal finances a priority and adopt these practices to spend more wisely. It might seem stressful now, but you’ll thank yourself later.

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Paige Wunder is currently traveling the world full-time with her husband. When she's not hiking in the mountains or planning a backpacking trip, she's taking a road trip or sampling some delicious craft beer. She loves sharing her adventures both big & small.

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20 Comments

There are indeed lots of ways to save money so you can travel. Thank you for all the organisational tips. I’ll probably only put one or two into action but I definitely agree that the 30 day rule is a good one to check you really want something!

Another way I like to save for my trips is by getting a travel points credit card and putting all my daily purchases on there. I’ve accumulated so many point that it has covered flights, hotels and car rentals for free on my travels 🙂

Budgeting shouldn’t be a goal—it should be the tool that helps you achieve your other goals.- I love that statement. I have to be honest, I am a long-term slow traveler, and when I first started to travel I used to struggle to budget, it was one of the hardest things for me to do. However over the years it’s become more natural for me to budget – One the best things I find is to just stop unnecessary spending, little things that you just don’t really need and that helps save quite a lot of money.

These are some very useful tips for saving money! I would say that it’s a bit like dieting, making lots of little conscious decisions along the way and for the whole part of the journey to your success. You are absolutely right in saying that you first of all need to get an understanding in what you income and expenses are and then defining your savings goal. A great resource for anyone who wants to get better control over the finances to realise their financial dreams.

I totally agree with your point of knowing the income and expenses! It’s so important that you actually know how much you earn and how much you spend. Especially when travelling, it’s always good to have an eye on your expenses. I never heard of free companies such as Qapital, but that sounds brilliant! The best thing you mention is probably the budget. When we travel we keep a very close eye on our budget to always know wether a second coctail is alowed or not 😀 Thank you for those great tipps.

Absolutely. It’s easy for your finances to get away from you when traveling. It’s so true though. We set a daily budget and always shoot to be under budget, but every so often we spring for that second cocktail 😉

lukeandmeagan

December 4, 2017 at 12:02 pm

These are such solid tips. From the time I got out of college, I’ve had some kind of automated savings plan in place. If I have to remember to make a withdrawal, it’s a HUGE pain and I usually forget – but automating it makes it painless, and I get to see my account grow every paycheck 🙂

Coincidently, I just wrote a post on how you can increase your savings by not letting them be idle. Investing back your savings always adds that extra income that you need. Glad you shared the other tips here like how to reduce wastage and unnecessary expenses. Cheers

I Haven’t Been Everywhere, But It’s On My List

Meet the Wanderer

As a lover of all things travel, Paige Wunder is falling in love with the world and its cultures one day at a time. She's a road trip aficionado, an avid hiker, lover of learning + culture and an all around wanderess. Follow along on her adventures - big and small - across this beautiful world.

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